With his leg almost completely severed, 32-year-old Jonathon Standridge had the awareness to have someone remove his belt and place it around his bleeding leg. That move may have saved his life.
Monday morning Standridge became pinned against a truck and a trailer in Lafayette Parish when a 90-year-old man driving a Ford truck hit Standridge as he was loading an excavator onto the trailer.
The accident occurred 4700 block of Landry Road, near the intersection of S. Fieldspan Road. The driver of the truck told police he was allegedly blinded by the sun and did not see Standridge and the trailer on the road.
Todd Menard, a 1981 Erath High graduate, and his family live across the street from where the accident occurred. His wife, Tonya, heard the accident and heard Standridge scream. She ran into her house to tell Menard. Menard, a pastor at New Life Church near Scott, rushed to the scene and saw Standridge with his leg severed and bleeding.
“I did not think he would make it,” said Menard. “I prayed with him to get right with God.”
After the two prayed, Standridge instructed Menard to take off the belt around Standridge’s pants and place it around the top of his injured leg to try and stop the bleeding. Menard said he made the belt as tight as he could. During the time, Menard said it felt like hours before the ambulance arrived when it was only minutes.
During the wait, his leg stopped bleeding, Menard said. He said it was “miraculous.”
Menard made it clear he was not the hero, it was Standridge, because, despite bleeding and his leg severed, he was conscious enough to make a life-saving decision to put his belt around his leg.
“He is the one who saved his own life,” Menard said. “I wanted to keep him calm and not let his heart start racing, pumping more blood.”
Standridge also gave Menard the phone number to his wife Kim so he could call her when he was en route to the hospital.
Pastor Menard made that call and explained to Standridge’s wife his leg was smashed in an accident and told her what hospital the ambulance was taking him to.
Pastor Menard and his wife went to the hospital later in the day to check on Standridge. Menard saw him being wheeled to surgery and said, “You are going to make it.”
They shook hands as Standridge was wheeled into surgery.
Standridge is expected to recover.